BROOD-PROTECTION is known to occur in thirty species of holothurians belonging to the orders Dendrochirota and Apoda. All are littoralâ sublittoral and most are inhabitants of cold seas, especially the Antarctic. The brood-protecting Dendrochirota usually carry their young on the body-surface or in pockets invaginated from the body-surface. Some Dendrochirota and most of the brood-protecting Apoda have a coelomic incubation, the juveniles passing through a free-swimming stage in the body-fluid of the mother. The Antarctic synaptid Taeniogyrus contortus (Ludwig) breeds the young within the ovaries, which they leave at a length of 3 mm (the adult specimens measure 20â 45 mm) (ref. 1).